


seventeen poems (you trip over your tongue)

by lizwillstealyourgirl



Series: seventeen poems [1]
Category: IT (2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bisexual Richie Tozier, Everyone Is Gay, Fluff and Angst, Gay Eddie Kaspbrak, Lesbian Beverly Marsh, M/M, Poetry, TRY AND STOP ME, anywya, ben and mike live together, ben works at a diner, but literally its not, just letting you know, reddie is implied, richie works at a movie theatre, thats not important but he does it so he can take eddie there for a discount, thats slightly more important
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-05
Updated: 2018-01-05
Packaged: 2019-02-28 16:06:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13275042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lizwillstealyourgirl/pseuds/lizwillstealyourgirl
Summary: love is an art, too.(ben is a poet, drowning in upper-middle poverty as brought unto him by america’s capitalist propaganda, and bill is a writer who’s stuck in his own void of creative forgetfulness.)





	seventeen poems (you trip over your tongue)

**Author's Note:**

> hi denscom is a rare pair but i love my soft bois!!!

  
ben thought about how the air feels against his skin, the fan above him beating like a drum. this sensation is one he’s never paid attention to before, because who cares that the breeze stutters onto his arm because the fan is old and creaky? who cares that the rush of cold comes and goes, in and out and in and out, lapping on his skin like waves on the shore? who cares how the air feels?

realistically, ben shouldn’t have cared. and he didn’t really, except he was hyper-aware of everything going on around him because of the words that had just been said. the words that could possibly determine his entire future, right up until the day he dies. the words that meant an outrageous something to him. the words that he was sure he couldn’t have heard correctly.

“you’re...gay?”

it really was not that big of a deal. he and beverly broke up a long, long time prior to this, but when beverly sat him down and explained that a girl and a girl can like each other the way a girl and a boy can, ben felt his heart pump out of his chest and his stomach fall and yeah, there’s the air on his skin faltering just a little bit as it danced across his body.

“yeah, i am.” beverly gave him a gentle kind of smile, the smile that said, _‘i still love you, and you’re my best friend, but we’re never getting back together’._

“okay,” ben took a breath. honestly, he’d been, in a way, holding out hope that one day she would realize what a nice guy ben is, and she would choose him, him. that didn’t appear to be the plan anymore, he realized in this moment. he exhaled. okay.

“is that...okay?” beverly asked, worried as if he would actually say no.

ben laughed. “of course.” he held out his hand for her to hold. “you’re my girl, bev. i got you.” beverly let out a breath she’d been holding since she sat him down a half an hour ago. “have you told anyone else?” ben wondered aloud.

beverly nodded. “only richie. he’s pretty helpful with gay stuff.”

“gay stuff,” ben repeated teasingly.

“shut up,” she shoved ben’s shoulders, like they hadn’t dated for two years just for her to end it over a text and a half, and then come out as gay a year later. ben had never held that against her anyway; he never could.

 

-

 

and that’s how it was. beverly was gay. ben was hopelessly devoted to her, but it wasn’t so much out of romance anymore. it felt a little more like the sister he had begged his mom for all throughout elementary school. of course, this sister was his ex, his best friend’s ex, his other best friend’s previous friend with benefits, and his best friend. the loser’s club was just always a little different.

she came out to each loser, one by one. stan next, then eddie, mike and bill. after that, the others starting opening up too.

everyone knew richie was queer at the very least, but no one really knew to what extent or how it applied to him. as deciphered by his jokes of spending nights with both eddie’s mom and eddie, richie admitted to his bisexuality not long after beverly came out. immediately after, eddie said he was also gay. the rest of them were straight, or so it seemed, but three to four was a pretty good ratio of queers to straights in their little club.

 

-

  
graduation seemed to be so daunting ahead of them. they would finally be official adults, after four years of high school and four years of college. hopefully, they would actually get full-time jobs and careers and shit, but until then, ben was stuck working at a local diner. it could have been worse; he could have richie’s job of cleaning up the movie theaters. and anyway, he was never really bored at work. somehow, just as he was feeling the surge of _‘oh my god,_ i _need to get out of this shithole,’_ bill would always appear. it was like he was some fairy godmother, in an oversized flannel and over-worn jeans.

usually, ben would be taking orders and cleaning tables and feeling his soul being dragged out of his body and into the trash can he was dumping the leftovers in, and he’d turn around at the ring of a bell because he just feels it in his bones that it’s bill denbrough with his raggedy notebook and silver pen.

ben would smile at him and clear him a table and bill would order the same thing every time - a crazy monkey caramel crunch. this sugar fest was a caramel, chocolate, banana, and oreo shake on salted caramel ice cream. ben thought it was absolutely disgusting because it was so sweet and sugary and rich that he could never finish it. bill, on the other hand, adored it. that was something ben always noticed, how bill would sit with his cup of sugar and gulp it down as he stared at his notebook and scratched on the paper with his pen, every single day.

one day, bill showed up, and ben had felt like falling apart since seven in the morning when he woke up for his stupid women’s studies class. (it was not stupid, obviously, it was amazing, but why, in all that is holy, would it start at half past seven in the morning?) he beamed so purely at ben that he almost broke then and there, but he pulled himself together for his customers and he brought bill his stupid, overpriced jug of diabetes and smiled as best he could with the pinch in his heart. somehow, bill noticed, like bill noticed every time.

“hey,” bill reached out and grabbed ben’s hand sweetly, “are y-you okay?”

ben’s breath stuttered, just like that air from that fan on that realistically uneventful day, and he begged himself to pull it together. “yeah,” he said in a monotone voice, as if he didn’t feel thousands of emotions all at once, “i’m fine.”

that _fine_ sounded so fake as it snapped out of his mouth, and bill could feel it too. ben turned to walk away and maybe he shouldn’t have and maybe he wouldn’t have if he just had a brain in that thick skull but still, bill grabbed his wrist again and pulled him back again and said to him for the first time, “i d-don’t b-b-believe you.”

and ben took that stuttered breath again, bouncing in his vocal chords like a shiver, just to close his eyes and hope they didn’t burn from the tears. “yeah, well, i’m working. i’ll be fine.” he said, with a little more feeling than before.

“w-when do you g-get off?” bill asked, because he really did care, he always cared.

“in, like, forty minutes.” ben looked at the clock and squinted at the hands as they ticked.

“o-okay. i-i’ll wait for you. just c-c-c,” he paused, “just s-sit when you’re done.” bill gave him that smile, the smile that he always gives him, the smile that makes ben’s ears ring and angels sing a choir in the back of his head, and ben pulled himself out of the trance and forced himself to turn and walk away.

this was the start of ben confiding in bill. well, really, it started forty-seven minutes later, when ben officially checked out and sat down across from bill with two spoons and a crazy monkey caramel crunch for them to share. ben went off in a mumbling tangent, talking about how sometimes he feels like the world could crash and burn and he wouldn’t be able to notice because he feels so selfish all the time. he talked about how he used to pray that beverly would choose him and now he regrets it because he wonders what kind of life he could’ve lived all these years if he didn’t live for a love he didn’t have. he talked about how he feels stuck, lost, isolated, and invisible all at once. and bill listened, like all the losers do, but bill talked back. he said his _“uh huh”_ s and “ _i get that”_ s but when ben said,  _“i’m so selfish,”_ bill said, _“i sometimes feel selfish too.”_

this something new, something he’d never done before: ben, trusting people. ben figured he could give it a shot.

 

-

  
and that’s how it was. when at the diner, bill would visit like he always did, and ben would tell him about that one customer that just got on his nerves while bill told him about that lady on the phone who had the most nasal voice, and they had each other’s backs. this transversed into a little bit more intimate, when bill started to come to ben and mike’s shared apartment to talk. bill would lay on the bed with his head and arms hanging of the edge while ben would rest on the floor beside him. then, ben started stopping by bill’s place, (swearing to mike it was just for writing/cooking/whatever tips) where he ended up with his head in bill’s lap and hands in his hair and arms linked and bodies intertwined. eventually, it turned into sleepovers and late night phone calls just because ben missed bill, but he never said that out loud anyway.

then, ben started writing poetry about boys with blue eyes who had too many words to string together so the syllables came out popping and bouncing. he wrote about the roses in his cheeks and the air stuttering onto his skin like that fan on that day when he thought he still loved that woman. he wrote about a costumed and heavy feeling that weighed down his heart, an anchor in the crashing waves of the deepest oceans. his poems read like lullabies that sang like hymns, so he wrote about the melodies this heart beat along to when he saw a the blue eyed boy with the stutter.

the answer didn’t come to him like he wanted it to. he didn’t even begin to realize his feelings under the twentieth or so poem was stashed under his bed once more, and his eye caught on the crumpled paper in the shoebox that at some point had gained a smudged, sharpie heart on the corner. at this moment, all he actually found was that he had questions and he didn’t know who to ask. he eventually did end up in beverly’s bedroom, kind of like how beverly ended up in his, but this time he was hanging off the bed like bill does, like bill would.

“i’m having a sexuality crisis,” he dropped the bomb bluntly enough, the second beverly walked through the door.

“good morning, beverly,” she mocked, “how was your day? did you have any fun classes today?” she used a deep voice that was supposed to sound like ben but sounded more like she got sick. in her regular voice she said, “oh, thanks, ben! yeah it was great, class was great. how are you? what’s up with your sexuality?”

“come on, bev. you’re gay. help me.”

“oh, i see how it is,” beverly laughed.

ben laughed a little too, though it might’ve only been funny because he was a little dizzy from hanging, and he wasn’t sure how bill did this all the time. “i’m not using you or anything. i’m serious. i’m writing poetry for a dude.”

“okay, well, for starters,” she sat down like ben did when bill had his crises, “what’s his name? who is this guy?”

“you know him,” ben mumbled.

beverly waved her hands impatiently. “just tell me, ben.”

“bill.” the word come out on his tongue less like a coherent sound and more like a grunt. fortunately, (or, perhaps, unfortunately) beverly had known ben long enough to know what the sounds coming from his mouth always meant.

“oh my god!” she jumped up to her feet, ben jumping with her to cover her mouth with his hands just in time to muffle the, _“you wrote about_ bill _!”_ that followed.

“yes, shut up, i know, okay?” he huffed, falling back onto the bed with his feet still planted on the floor. “i can’t believe it. i’m feeling super gay.”

beverly laughed, and flopped over next to him. “do you think you’re gay?”

“oh my god,” he said, “i have no idea. like, zero. absolutely none.”

beverly laughed again like his sexuality crisis was a punchline. “i promise, you’re going to be fine.”

ben pouted, and turned to his side to look at her. “do i tell him? do i get over it? do they mean something?”

“have you been hanging out with him a lot lately?”

_yes,_ ben thought, _the longest_ i’ve _gone without seeing him since the diner is 12 hours and that’s today._ “yeah,” he said, “more than a lot.”

“what kind of poems are they?” beverly asked hesitantly, almost like she wanted them to be friendly as much as ben wanted them to be.

“i brought them.” he grabbed his shoebox with the heart in the corner and she stifled a laugh.

“how many are there?”

“like twenty,” he sighed, so dramatically, and flopped over on the bed once more, like his whole life was a lie and everything in the world was wrong.

“read one to me,” she demanded, and so he did.

he actually read all seventeen to her before she grabbed the shoebox and started shuffling through the papers. “you’re in love with bill,” beverly denoted, “this is awesome. you’re totally in love with bill!” in between her nimble fingers sat the crumpled papers than left ben’s heart in pieces. on each page there was too much of a story for ben to feel okay, to feel happy. isn’t love supposed to make you happy?

“do i tell him?” ben whispered again, like his soul had been broken and crumbled like an avalanche.

“i think you should,” beverly said so honestly and rawly, “but do you think you should?”

_did he?_

bill had been there for ben. but all those existential crises lead to sharing their favorite books and talking about the afterlife and they kept having those kinds of conversations that never seem to end. the kind where you don’t realize you’re falling asleep until you’ve woken up, the kind where you say the things that mean the most to you and then wonder if you could take it back until he says something that means the most to him too. bill had been there for ben, at the diner, at his apartment, at bill’s apartment, at libraries and coffee shops and restaurants they couldn’t pronounce the names of. if ben told bill, he could ruin everything. but, if ben told bill, and bill felt the same way...

“yeah.” ben’s voice sounded like a sad kind of song, teary and dreary and melancholy when he said, “i think i should.”

 

-

 

it was three nights later when ben was ready to see bill again. they’d talked on the phone, but every time bill asked to come over, ben made up some bullshit about being sick or being busy or drowning in homeward or whatever came to mind. he felt so guilty about lying, which might have been what pushed him to tell bill once and for all. _maybe,_ he thought, _this could make it better._

bill called him on the night of that third day, and asked if he could come over. ben almost wanted to take it all back, to say no, to leave bill hanging and never talk to him again just so he could escape this feeling of _floating and drowning and reviving and floating_ again. but ben did not say no.

“yeah, come over.” ben said finally, like even though he wanted to say no, he couldn’t. like the yes was creeping through his bones and staining his lips and forcing the words out.

“okay,” bill said, and ben almost thought he could hear a smile in his voice, or maybe he was just lying to himself.

twenty minutes later, bill knocked on ben’s door and the pounding was too gentle and too hesitant to be familiar to ben. usually, bill’s knocking was fast paced, upbeat, and unmelodious, as if his knuckles stuttered like his words. ben’s feet found their way to bill a little too fast, and his hands opened the door a little too shakily. “hi,” he said, ever so breathlessly, when the door creaked open. bill smiled back at him, softly and sweetly and again ben was floating and drowning and reviving and floating again.

“hey,” bill’s voice was a song, but while ben’s song was sad, bill’s tasted like pineapple and smelled like the ocean; it was a flame from a match that flickered to the tune.

“do you want to go for a walk? i, uh, i need a breather.” ben smiled and maybe it wasn’t as pretty as the smile that bill gave to him but it was one from the deepest pits of his stomach and it was honest and real.

“y-yeah, let’s g-go,” was all ben needed before he raced out the door, only pausing for a second to confirm that the folded paper in his pocket had not ran away in fear like he so desperately wanted to.

they walked to the park that ben had been to once or twice before. he sort of traversed mindlessly, and as his feet hit the floor all he could think about was the journey instead of the destination. all he could think about was how close bill was standing to him, and how the air stuttered on his skin just like it had when beverly came out to him, and how all the roles were now reversed and the show was starting in a way that ben had never expected. the hairs on his arm stood up just as their elbows brushed together, and his breath staggered from maybe the exercise or maybe the fact that he could almost hear bill’s heart beating if he leaned down to the right just a little bit...

“are y-y-you o-okay?” bill asked, pulling ben’s thoughts to a full stop. ben took a deep, shivering breath and nodded.

“i have to tell you something,” he rushed out, thoughtlessly painting the words in the air, too fast for him erase them.

“w-w-what’s wr-wrong?” bill asked, all kindly with his brows furrowed just like ben couldn’t stand for him to do, just like ben knew he would.

ben stopped walking at the first bench he saw and sat down. immediately, bill followed, and sat next to him, closer than ben could handle. he felt like he was suffocating and he prayed to god that this _floating-drowning-reviving-floating_ feeling would go away if he just used his words.

he pulled out the crumpled up pages. twenty of them. he didn’t look at them, he couldn’t manage the sight of this unrequited, painful, irresistible feeling that bill made him feel. he just slammed them onto bill’s lap and whispered out an _"i’m sorry"_  than practically meant nothing.

“w-what a-a-are these?” bill’s stutter was breathy and confused and, god, did ben hate how uncomfortably beautiful it sounded.

“um...” ben sighed, the wheels turning in his brain were so loud, so it was practically impossible for the words to come out right. “poems,” was all he could manage, and he added on a, “you.”

“t-t-they’re about m-me?” bill whispered, and ben wondered for a second if he was flattered. ben nodded. “but t-t-they’re l-l-l,” he paused, “t-they’re r-romantic.” he spat out.

“yeah,” ben agreed.

bill flipped through them, a smile almost gracing his lips. “t-there’s a l-l-lot of them.”

“yeah,” ben agreed.

bill smiled. “c-c-can you say a-anything other t-than y-y-y-yeah?”

“yeah,” ben teased again, and he smiled a little bit.

“c-c-can i r-read th-them?” bill asked, nervous and flustered and scared.

“yeah,” ben said without thinking, before adding on, “i’m surprised you haven’t yet.”

bill looked at ben, and ben thought he saw stars in bill’s eyes and he wondered for a second if the freckles on his cheeks were constellations too. “i-i...i just w-wanted to b-b-be sure.”

so bill sat and read them. every single damned one of them. he read the ones that were sad, and the ones that were happy, and the ones that were pretty, and the ones that ben didn’t even understand. bill read all seventeen of them and ben couldn’t help but think about how much he wanted bill to like them. and when bill finished, he rested his head on ben’s shoulder.

“what,” ben gulped, “what did you think?”

bill pulled his head away and looked at ben’s face. ben turned away, his eyes tracing instead the grass that seemed to sway from the breath of angels. a hand grasped ben’s chin, turning his head to face bill’s, and ben thought his heart was going to burst (or maybe that was his stomach) when bill’s eyes were stormy and dark and traced over ben’s face like waves crashing onto the rocks of a bay area shore. and his heart fell back in place when bill leaned in, and ben’s brain must of shorted out because his thoughts played, like a broken record, _oh my god oh my god oh my god_ , over and over and over, and that _floating-drowning-reviving-floating_ felt more like _floatingfloatingfloatingfloating_ , and when their lips touched, ben felt like all of his stupid poetry had finally came true.

 

* * *

 

 

>   
>  seventeen, 12/28/17, canis majoris  
>  _his words are wildfires on his raw tongue,_  
>  _the sentences he barely strings together are forests alight._  
>  _his eyes are blue and green and though they are not ablaze,_  
>  _they flicker like a star burning out in the sky._  
>  _his words are flames and his sentences are sparks and his eyes are constellations that explode like fireworks on new year’s eve,_  
>  _so i can’t help but wonder if his lips burn too._
> 
>  

~~_fin._ ~~

**Author's Note:**

> i hope u enjoyed part 1  
> part 2 will be put up soon but you dont need to read it  
> and technically you could read all 4 separately but pls dont bc it'd be cool if u read them all!!!!!!  
> my tumblr is lizwillstealyourgirl.tumblr.com  
> shoot me an ask with your thoughts ! or comment :)))))))  
> thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!!


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